


make it through the night

by teacass (Fushigi)



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Angst, Coda, Episode Related, Episode Tag, Episode: s06e20 The Man Who Would Be King, M/M, One Shot, POV Sam Winchester, Pre-Slash
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-17
Updated: 2016-01-17
Packaged: 2018-05-14 14:14:17
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,247
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5747485
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fushigi/pseuds/teacass
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He imagines Dean sitting up on the couch, fully awake and alert, Cas standing just beside the couch, looking down at him, in the same way he always looks at Dean: as if Dean is the only thing in the room worth looking at.</p>
            </blockquote>





	make it through the night

**Author's Note:**

> I rewatched 6x20 tonight and couldn't get that scene out of my head. This is just a small rewriting of Dean and Cas' fight as seen from Sam's point of view.  
> Title from The Libertines' song "The Man Who Would Be King". Unbeta'd, all mistakes are mine.

Sam can’t sleep, so he gets up from the creaky bed in one of Bobby’s guest bedrooms and goes down the stairs to look for something to eat.

The kitchen is dark and quiet, the angry red of the angel-proofing Bobby has drawn on the windows stark against the pale walls of the house. Sam shakes his head and looks away. He remembers Dean’s pained face when they suggested warding themselves and the way his hands turned into fists as he left the house and didn’t come back for the next hour. It was late when he showed up again, Bobby had already retired upstairs and Sam had just finished his beer. When he offered to stay up, Dean shook his head and sent him to bed.

Sam glances into the library and sighs when he sees Dean sprawled on the couch, still in his clothes, arms crossed over his chest as if he was fighting even in his sleep. Sam doesn’t want to wake him, so he backs inside the kitchen to snatch something from the fridge.

He knocks over a couple of empty bottles lying on the floor and he winces.

Dean stirs in the library; Sam can hear the soft rustle of his clothes and his quiet sigh, but before he can call out and apologise for waking him, he hears another sound.

The flapping of the wings.

The instinct tells Sam to immediately barge into the room, but he freezes for a few seconds and strains his ears to hear anything.

He doesn’t have to wait long.

“Hello, Dean,” Castiel says.

Sam can’t see anything--he’s hidden behind the wall between the library and the kitchen--but it’s so quiet in the house he can still hear almost every sound. He imagines Dean sitting up on the couch, fully awake and alert, Cas standing just beside the couch, looking down at him, in the same way he always looks at Dean: as if Dean is the only thing in the room worth looking at.

Dean speaks just after a few seconds, voice hoarse and low. “How’d you get in here?”

It won’t be a pleasant conversation, Sam thinks. Dean is tired and upset. They’ll butt heads for a while, trying to explain everything but ending up making even a bigger mess of the thing that’s always been between them. Sam could interfere, but Dean would become even more defensive and stubborn with another person in the room; he’d rather turn cold and heartless than show the mass of emotions bubbling inside him.

“The angel-proofing Bobby put up on the house... He got a few things wrong,” Cas says flatly.

Sam glances at the warding signs on the kitchen windows but stays where he is.

“Well,” Dean says, “it’s too bad we got to angel-proof in the first place, isn’t it?” There’s another rustle of the clothes and a quiet grunt--Dean must be standing up to face Castiel. “Why are you here?”

Someone takes two slow steps; Sam can almost see Cas moving close to Dean, head up, eyes never leaving Dean’s. Dean would straighten his shoulders and swallow nervously, but stare back right at Cas.

“I want you to understand--”

“Oh, believe me, I get it,” Dean cuts in, sarcastic. “Blah, blah, Raphael, right?”

Sam bites his lip and looks down, rueful. Dean knows exactly where to bite so that it hurts the most. They both do.

But Castiel also knows how to disarm Dean with words, honest in a way Dean never is.

“I’m doing this for you, Dean,” he says, frustration audible in his voice. “I’m doing this _because of you_.”

He could mean all of them--Sam, Bobby, the entire human race--but he never does. Not when he’s talking with Dean.

Sam has heard Cas say things like that many times, so for a split second he can almost imagine Dean’s shocked face, his wide eyes unbelieving. But this time is different. Dean snorts, humourless.

“ _Because of me_. Yeah.” His voice changes, sounding a little closer to the kitchen. Sam shifts but doesn’t leave, waiting for Dean to continue. When he does, his words are a bit muffled. “You gotta be kidding me.”

There’s a short silence between them. Sam doesn’t know if they’re still facing each other, looking at each other, but he wouldn’t be surprised if they were.

Then Cas says, “You’re the one that taught me that freedom and free will--”

Dean doesn’t let him finish the thought. “You’re a freakin’ child, you know that?” he says, angry again. Sam hears steps and now he’s sure they’re close to each other again. Dean raises his voice. “Just because you can do what you want doesn’t mean you get to do _whatever_ you want!”

“I know what I’m doing, Dean,” Cas drawls.

They’re quiet for another long moment. Sam considers leaving, he would hate to interrupt them--maybe he’s wrong, maybe they’ll manage to talk this through, and Dean will convince Cas to abandon his plans?--but then Dean speaks up again.

“I’m not gonna logic you, okay?” His words are quiet again, voice low and dangerously close to breaking. “I’m saying: _don’t_. Just ‘cause.” He sounds honest, raw, pleading. Sam can’t even imagine the look on Cas’ face. “I’m asking you not to. That’s it.”

“I don’t understand.”

“Look, next to Sam, you and Bobby are the closest things I have to family. You are like a brother to me.”

Sam closes his eyes at the clear ache in Dean’s voice. He knows this is Dean playing his last card. If Dean talks about family, he’s close to cracking. If Cas backs away now--this is it. Dean will turn away and won’t look at him again.

“If I’m asking you not to do something… You gotta trust me, man.”

“Or what?”

Sam stands there, in the dark, ears ringing in the silence that falls in the library. The air changes; it crackles, turns sharper, hurtful, bewildered.

Dean doesn’t say anything for a long time, and when he does, he sounds icy cold.

“Or I’ll have to do what I have to do to stop you.”

“You can’t, Dean. You’re just a man.” Cas’ tone is flat, vacant. “I’m an angel.”

“I don’t know, I’ve taken some pretty big fish,” Dean says. His choice of words means he’s trying to sound threatening, but instead he just seems numb.

Sam can almost feel the inevitable end of the conversation. They’re both too stubborn, too heartbroken. They won’t fix it now--maybe they will never fix it.

“I’m sorry, Dean,” Cas says and Sam knows he means it. It still doesn’t change anything, though; it _can’t_ change anything. He doesn’t have to be there with them to see the way they’re looking at each other right now.

When Dean says he’s sorry, he doesn’t mean it.

The wings flap loudly and Sam exhales. He wants to move and go upstairs, leave Dean alone with his thoughts, but then Dean comes into the kitchen and spots him standing by the fridge.

For a moment, neither of them move or say anything. Dean’s face is pale, jaw tense, eyes wet. He looks down and shakes his head, silently begging Sam not to say anything.

So he doesn’t. He reaches to the fridge and pulls out two bottles of beer. When he offers one to Dean, he snatches it wordlessly and goes back to the library.

Sam leaves him alone.


End file.
